Mrs. Poor curtsied very low, and smiled a vague, abject smile of propitiation.
“If ye please, marm, I'm Mis Poor. He's in this ere jail fer debt. He's kinder pulin like, Zadkiel is, an I jess fetched daown some yarbs fer him. He's been uster takin on em, an they doos him good, specially the sassafras. An I thort mebbe, marm, I mout git tew see him, bein ez he ain't a well man, an never wuz sence I married him, twenty-five year agone come nex' Thanksgivin.”
“And I want to see father, if you please, marm. My father's George Fennell. Is he very sick marm?” added Prudence eagerly, seeing that Mrs. Poor was forgetting her.
“I don' keer who ye be, an ye needn' waste no time o' tellin me,” replied Mrs. Bement, her pretty blue eyes as hard as steel. “Ye couldn't go intew that jail not ef ye wuz Gin'ral Washington. I ain't goin ter hev no women folks a bawlin an a blubberin roun' this ere jail's long's my husban' keeps it, an that's flat.
“I won't cry a bit, if you'll only let me see father,” pleaded Prudence, two great tears gathering in her eyes, even as she spoke, and testifying to the value of her promise. “And—and I'll scrub the floor for you, too. It needs it, and I'm a good scrubber, Mrs. Woodbridge says I am.”
“I'd take it kind of ye, I would,” said Mrs. Poor, “ef ye'd let me in jess fer a minit. He'd set store by seein of me, an I could give him the yarbs. He ain't a well man, an never wuz, Zadkiel ain't. Ye needn't let the gal in. It don' matter 's much about her, an gals is cryin things. I'll scrub yer floor better'n she ever kin, an come to look it doos kinder need it,” and she turned her agonized eyes a moment upon the floor in affected critical inspection.
“Cephas, see that crowd comin. What do they mean? Put them women out. G'long there, git out, quick! Shut the door, Cephas. Put up the bar. What ever's comin to us?”
Well might Mrs. Bement say so, for the sight that had caught her eyes as she stood confronting the women and the open door, was no less an one than a mass of nearly a thousand men and boys, bristling with clubs and guns, rushing directly toward the jail.
Scarcely had the women been thrust out, and the white-faced Bement dropped the bar into its sockets across the middle of the door, than there was a rushing, tramping sound before the house, like the noise of many waters, and a great hubbub of hoarse voices. Then came a heavy blow, as if with the hilt of a sword against the door, and a loud voiced called,
“Open, and be quick about it!”